Lubricant users are increasingly inquiring about the cleanliness and lubricant quality of new oil deliveries.

This trend is logical and probably unending as the maintenance field becomes more aware of the linkage between contamination and machine reliability. Yet there has been legitimate concerns raised by some lubricant suppliers regarding this trend.

These concerns center on the common disregard for proper storage and handling by distributors, transport companies and, in particular, the end user.

After all, how practical is it to go to the extra expense to deliver a clean, high-quality lubricant when this integrity is subsequently adulterated by careless handling and storage practices. Yet it is also not logical to be less vigilant in delivering clean lubricants of dependable high quality.

From my experience, the answer to this dilemma lies in managing the chain of custody from the lubricant supplier to the end user.

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Users of hydraulic equipment need to know how clean their fluid should be. The information and procedure for determining this has not been readily available in the past. This has been largely due to the many factors· that impinge on the decision. This paper introduces a new· system called the Contaminant Life Index (figure 1) which deals with this question head on. The Contaminant Life Index addresses each of the many issues involved in determining required system cleanliness. These factors are presented in a simple, easy to follow format. The CLI delineates only the most salient criteria with the objective to span the numerous diverse types of hydraulic equipment in use.

The post Quantifying The Contaminant Tolerance of Hydraulic Systems Using the Contaminant Life Index appeared first on Tesibis.

Process plants and manufacturing companies have machinery lubricated by mineral-based or synthetic fluids and other machinery powered by lower viscosity hydraulic fluids. We define equipment of this type as fluid-dependent systems. Examples of this include gear boxes, process pumps, gas compressors, speed reducers, blowers, hydraulic metal working machines and machine tools.

When machines have wear, corrosion and associated problems that eventually lead to corrective action, we categorize these problems as internal state failures. Often, equipment operates infrequently, under very low loads, and away from the main production processes. In such cases, it may be perfectly acceptable to operate this equipment with scheduled maintenance activities or simply on a breakdown basis.

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By now, most lubrication professionals are keenly aware of the reliability gains associated with contamination control. Those who have traveled down this road know that clean and dry lubricants often come at a price.

However, best practice may have nothing to do with removing contaminants or changing the oil. Actually, it may have nothing to do with the oil at all. Instead, it’s a practice of stabilizing the cleanliness and dryness in the headspace environment – the air above the oil in tanks, reservoirs and lubrication compartments.

Why is this important? First, a high percentage of the particles and moisture that ingress into lubricating oils and hydraulic fluids must pass through the headspace. Therefore, the practice of excluding contaminants from entering the headspace, by default, excludes contaminants from entering the oil. This can be accomplished by channeling incoming ambient air through desiccant breathers that remove water and dirt.

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Do you really know how your lubricants become contaminated? Have you taken an inventory of the sources of contamination and the primary points of entry? If not, you are in the majority as sadly, few organizations go to the trouble of performing a contaminant ingression study.

For many machines, the exclusion of contamination is the only way to control contamination. This is because these machines either have no filter or the filter in use is coarse, providing no practical protection in the particle size range of critical oil films.

When particles are not removed by filtration or by settling, a lubricant’s contaminant level equals the machine’s service hours multiplied by the number of particles ingressed per hour (ingression rate). For machines exposed to high ambient dust, particle counts can exceed recommended levels in just a few hours. After days of exposure, an oil can turn into more of a honing compound than a lubricating medium.

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